Question Messed up HDD's Partition hex value, now can't access it anymore

[dragonilly]

Similar to: https://forums.tomshardware.com/thr...disk-and-now-its-not-working-anymore.1589018/

Hi everyone, I know it's been 10 years since this topic was last discussed, however history tends to repeat itself.
I also messed around with a Seagate 1500GB hdd. More specifically I messed with the hex values of its partition, in basically the same way. "edited line 1c0 changing 42 to 07" . I did this because I was accessing the drive via a Linux OS, and without my knowledge Windows had turned the drive into a RAID one(alongside a 1TB WD drive).
Now something went wrong during the edit and now the drive has become completely unusable. it needs to be connected either via USB, or if using a SATA interface then AHCI. No recovery software can do anything with it though. Can't initialize it in windows, and everywhere it says 0KB, even the hex editor only shows 1 line with 0 value.

I don't care that much about the data inside(it would be cool to recover them though). What I care is just to get the HDD back to be able to use it as a storage device. the bios correctly recognizes it as a 1500GB drive.

Any advice?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Can't initialize it in windows, and everywhere it says 0KB, even the hex editor only shows 1 line with 0 value.

If it is connected with sata cable and displaying 0kb capacity, then the drive is dead.

If it's connected with USB sata adapter, then there may be a problem with the adapter.

 

[dragonilly]

It's the same behavior with both. The interesting thing is that even with the SATA cable, I had to play with the sata interface. If I did an IDE connection, windows wouldn't detect anything. If set to AHCI in the BIOS, then it appears same as if it was connected via USB adapter.

I doubt it is dead, since the drive was completely healthy, rarely used, and the BIOS can correctly detect the size. The motor spins, and the only messup was a software one in the partition hex table.

 

[SkyNetRising]

The interesting thing is that even with the SATA cable, I had to play with the sata interface. If I did an IDE connection, windows wouldn't detect anything. If set to AHCI in the BIOS, then it appears same as if it was connected via USB adapter.

Can you connect it with sata cable and show screenshot from Disk Management?
(upload to imgur.com a and post link)

BTW - what is model name of the drive? How old is it?

 

[fzabkar]

Can you obtain a SMART report with CrystalDiskInfo?

https://crystalmark.info/en/software/crystaldiskinfo/

 

[TerryLaze]

and the only messup was a software one in the partition hex table.

But then it would show up as uninitialized or raw, you can't mess the partition table up enough for it to show as 0, that's a firmware level of screw up.
And even if you could a low level format would restore it.
For it to show up as 0 either the drive or a controller is broken.

 

[fzabkar]

But then it would show up as uninitialized or raw ...

"edited line 1c0 changing 42 to 07" -- this changes the partition ID for the MBR partition from "dynamic" to "NTFS".

 

[TerryLaze]

"edited line 1c0 changing 42 to 07" -- this changes the partition ID for the MBR partition from "dynamic" to "NTFS".

Yes, but obviously it didn't turn into ntfs.

 

[fzabkar]

Yes, but obviously it didn't turn into ntfs.

It probably did, but then the drive appears to have suffered an unrelated failure. A capacity of 0 is a common failure symptom of earlier Seagate models, eg 7200.11, 7200.12.

 

[dragonilly]

Hi gentlemen,

Trying to answer everyone at the same time here.
First things first:

https://imgur.com/a/F4pMmJl

View: https://imgur.com/a/F4pMmJl

Please find attached screenshots with info from different recovery softwares and windows disk manager.

For some reason, the size of the drive appears now in Windows. I haven't changed a thing. Not a cable, nothing. The drive still is connected via SATA, and I'm using Windows PE to access it.

Until yesterday Disk Manager couldn't show any size of the disk, just RAW and 0KB.
CrystalDiskInfo can't find it.

And yes the point was to change it to NTSF, from RAID. Obviously it went wrong.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Trying to answer everyone at the same time here.

So - it's a 13-15 years old drive. Right?
Replace.

 

[fzabkar]

It may be possible to recover your data, but be prepared for a lot of effort:

https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=38411

 

[dragonilly]

It may be possible to recover your data, but be prepared for a lot of effort:

https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=38411

I don't mind honestly. It's a nice side project. Thank you for the suggestion.

So - it's a 13-15 years old drive. Right?
Replace.

The drive has been used very rarely, almost not at all the last 4-5 years.